Initium 101 - A Beginners Manual
Introduction to Initium Welcome, Player, to the land of Initium! Assuming you have created a character already, we are about to take our first steps into a massive, open world full of danger, adventure, camaraderie and loot. If you have not yet created your own character, feel free to do so at any time by visiting the home page. Further details on this process are below. For now, make yourself a hot beverage, sit back, and together we will walk through just a fraction of what Initium has to offer. If at any time you feel ready to dive straight in, go for it! You will find the in-game chat is filled with helpful players willing to guide you on your adventure. Character Creation Let us begin by exploring the character creation process, which is how you will be opening your personal Initium account. Browse to the homepage of Initium, and click the 'Signup!' button in the top left. You will be prompted for: * Your character name (which must be unique). * Your email account, for account recovery (you will never be spammed by the developers). * A password to protect your account. You can select anything you like, but the strongest password is a series of words (for example: treehousemonstertruck). To take some worries off your shoulders, in what should be a relaxed yet exciting journey, know that: * All accounts and characters are entirely free to create * All accounts and characters are permanent, and are not deleted if they become inactive Now, let us begin! From Humble Beginnings First Steps Having created a character, we are now ready to take our first steps into the world of Initium. When we enter the game world, we will find ourselves in the middle of a city, Aera. This is the central hub of the world, and you will return here many times over to rest, trade goods, enlist the help of other players, and store your loot. For now, note that you are able to travel to several places, both within the town and outside its walls. The options we have available to us within the town's protective walls are: * The Aera Town Hall, where you can purchase property, if your pockets are deep enough. * The Aera Inn, where you can rest and tend to your wounds. Word is that with the recent increase in troll and bandit raids around the city perimeter the barman is offering free accommodation. We could also leave the safety of the city to go explore by travelling to the Aera Countryside. This area has recently been swarming with trolls pouring out of a nearby den. For now, let's remain in Aera to take a look around and get our bearings. Communication is a Virtue Before we get ourselves geared up to start carving out our own legacy, it might pay to review the information presented to us in the game overlay. In the center of the screen you will find the chat window, separated into 5 channels. These allow you to communicate with other players, and function as follows: * Global: The world-wide channel all players can communicate in. * Location: The channel only others players in your location can see and talk in. * Group: The channel restricted to your group. We have not pledged our allegiance to any group as of yet, so this channel will be empty. * Party: The channel where you can chat you your current party. If you are not in a party (such as now), the channel will function as a second global channel for everyone who is running solo. * Private: A channel for you to send and receive private messages. Now that we have learnt to talk, go ahead and say hi. We will continue when you have introduced yourself. The HUD Above the chat window, you will find a lot of information about yourself, your condition, your health, and other vital information. Lets walk through it together: * Right above the group chat you will find the local area, displaying any places you can travel from your current location. Take a note of the current weather! If it is raining (or snowing), different monsters will roam the wilds. You will also need to pay more attention to keeping warm, so you don't risk dying from exposure (Coming Soon!). * In the top left corner of the screen you will see your name, health-pool, and an empty grey box. While the first two are self-explanatory, the last displays your current equipment. Oh dear, you arrived naked... We will deal to that soon enough, lets continue. * If you click your name, you will see a variety of meta-game options available. Do not concern yourself with these at the moment, but take note of where to find them later for when I have abandoned you in favor of a beer at the inn. If you click the equipment box, you will see your character details in full, including stats (we will get to those later), current and maximum carry weight and equipment among other things. * Finally, in the top right you will find a menu bar. From left to right the icons display your map, your inventory, your carried gold, the settings menu and the mute button. A Hero Born and Bred Let us look you over and assess your ability to be the hero this land needs, before we get you some clothes. You have three primary attributes, currently all at a base level of 5. These are: * Strength (STR), which affects your maximum health, carry weight, the force behind your blows, and your abiltity to wield many items. * Dexterity (DEX), which affects your ability to land blows on your opponents, as well as evade any counter-blows. This stat will also affect your ability to flee from combat. * Intelligence (INT), which affects your chance to detect weak points in the armor of your opponents and land critical hits. This also affects your ability to craft (Coming Soon!). The Beginning of Rags to Riches Alright, I think we have all seen enough of you. Let's get you some clothes! We have no gold to spare, so this is not a time to be picky! Click the 'Nearby Items' button and have a look at what you can find around town. If you cannot find anything useful, you could also check if anything has been left behind in the Area Inn. Once you have found some gear, you can equip it by going into your inventory and selecting the 'equip' button under the items you wish to equip. Remember: you need to meet the STR requirement of each piece of equipment you want to use! From head to toe, you should aim to deck yourself out with: * Helmet: Aim to find a leather cap. Anything else will do too. * Chest: Aim to find some leather armor. If you are lucky, you may come across a leather armor and cloak. * Shirt: Even the worst shirts have some value, so don't get bogged down searching for one. * Gloves: Aim for leather gloves. Hardened leather gloves and padded leather gloves are great too! * Legs: To keep with the theme, some leather pants would be great. * Boots: Anything to stop you stubbing your toes. Leather boots are just fine. * Right hand: A weapon. Anything will do here. Aim for a weapon with an average damage of 4. * Left hand: A Shield. Aim for a shield with less than a 3% DEX penalty, and at least 40% chance to block. * Rings and Necklace: Very funny! We are poor, remember? If some of these items are not freely available, don't stress it! We can loot them off the corpses of our enemies in a minute. That being said, you will need AT LEAST a weapon of some kind before moving on to the next section. Getting Dressed Ah, I see you have finally got some clothes on. Excellent! Let's go into some more depth on how item statistics work. If you are getting impatient for blood, feel free to move on. I'll catch up. For a more detailed explanation of the game mechanics, you can have a look at the Initium mechanics page. Items The world of Initium is filled with items, ranging from the useless to the impossibly rare. Most of these are obtained by looting them off the corpses of your enemies. If you encounter a troll wielding a steel shield and a spear, killing that troll will allow you to loot that steel shield and spear. Capiche? Armour When you click any piece of armor, you will be presented with a list of statistics for that item. Lets walk through these together: * Armor Type: Where you can wear this armor (e.g. on your head, or on your feet). * Dexterity Penalty: The DEX penalty this armor imposes upon you when worn. Heavier armor tends to offer more protection than light armor, at the cost of a heftier DEX penalty. * Strength Requirement: The STR requirement to allow you to equip this item. * Block Chance: The chance this piece of armor will catch a blow, if it is hit. * Damage Reduction: The damage reduction the armor affords you, if it blocks a blow. * Block Bludgeoning: How well the armor blocks bludgeoning attacks (such as clubs and hammers). * Block Piercing: How well the armor blocks piercing attacks (such as rapiers). * Block Slashing: How well the armor blocks slashing attacks (such as swords). * Weight: The weight of the item. * Space: The size of the item. * Warmth: The protection against the elements provided by the item. * Durability: The durability of the item. If this falls to zero, the item is destroyed. Weapons Likewise, when you click any weapon, you will be presented with a list of statistics for that item. Lets walk through these together as well: * Weapon Type: Tells us whether the weapon is one-handed or two-handed. * Dexterity Penalty: The DEX penalty this weapon imposes upon you when worn. * Strength Requirement: The STR requirement to allow you to equip this item. * Weapon Damage: The damage dealt by the weapon, defined as a set of dice rolls (D&D style) * Critical Chance: The chance of inflicting a critical hit * Critical Hit Multiplier: The damage multiplier if a critical hit is inflicted * Damage Type: The type of damage dealt by this weapon. * Block Chance: The chance this weapon will catch a blow. * Damage Reduction: The damage reduction the weapon affords you, if it blocks a blow. * Block Bludgeoning: How well the weapon blocks bludgeoning attacks (such as clubs and hammers). * Block Piercing: How well the weapon blocks piercing attacks (such as rapiers). * Block Slashing: How well the weapon blocks slashing attacks (such as swords). * Weight: The weight of the item. * Space: The size of the item. * Durability: The durability of the item. If this falls to zero, the item is destroyed. Other Of course, there are many items that do not fall into the above categories, and I will leave it up to you to discover those during your travels. That being said, don't ever let me catch you hauling around any unicorn meat. There will be hell to pay! From Zero to Hero We are now ready to venture out into the wilderness, Player! When you are ready, travel to Aera Countryside. Getting Around Now that you have left the town, you are free to explore as you see fit (to do so, push the 'Explore' button). You will stumble across many things, such as new places, monsters, campsites (maintained and abandoned ones) and old combat sites. Lets step through these real quick: * New Places: An area you have never been before! * Monsters: Something that wants to kill you. Kill it first, and loot its corpse. * Campsites: These are built by players and are used as a place to rest. If they are not defended, over time the monsters and environment will reclaim the campsite, destroying it and rendering it useless. * Old Combat Sites: A site where a battle took place. You may find loot that was left behind. Fighting Like a Man (Or a Woman) Sooner or later you will find yourself face to face with something that wants to krill you. You now have a decision to make, whether to flee or fight. If you choose to fight, swing your weapon at the monster. Every time you swing your weapon, the monster will get a chance to counterattack (provided it is still alive). Keep a close eye on your health-pool, and flee if the situation gets dire (a good guideline is to make yourself scarce if your health drops below two-thirds of its maximum). If you choose to flee, you will have to make a DEX roll. If successful, you will escape from the combat and be returned to the world map. If you fail, the monster will have the chance to attampt to attack you once, before you are able to try and flee again. Tending to Your Wounds Sooner or later, you will get wounded. It happens to the best of us, and the difference between surviving and dying lies in how you deal with being injured. Initium is no place for the excessively brave, or the foolish; they are all dead. To heal up, return to your home, an inn in any of the major towns, or find your way to a campsite. Selecting the option to rest will then initiate a wait sequence where every second restores one of your hitpoints. Suggested Course of Action The Inevitable Question: What is the Endgame? Fin Well Initiate, I am impressed you have made it this far. I wish you all the best on your journey. See you in Initium! -DutchmanCategory:Guides